The Case of the Problematic Poodle - Part 2

Last time, in Part 1, we went over how, after a trial in 2021 in the Provincial Court of British Columbia, Mr. Ian Sisett was convicted of an offence against the Responsible Dog Ownership Bylaw of the Regional District of Central Okanagan and fined $1,000.  To be precise, he was convicted of causing or permitting Charlie to become a dangerous dog contrary to Section 36 of the bylaw, and this conviction was due to an incident which occurred on January 29th, 2020.  In that incident, Mr. Sisett had been exercising Charlie off-leash on the field of a college campus in Kelowna, British Columbia when Charlie had bitten and caused serious injuries to a smaller dog named Spike, owned by a Ms. Melanie Michaels.

Unsatisfied with the outcome of the trial, Mr. Sisett decided to appeal his conviction.  The appeal was filed, and, in the spring of 2022, heard before Justice G.P. Weatherill of the Supreme Cout of British Columbia.

For the appeal, Mr. Sisett enumerated multiple grounds on which he believed his conviction should be overturned.  As he had during his original trial, Mr. Sisett alleged that the Regional District of Central Okanagan, and its animal control officer and prosecutor, were biased against him.  In addition to that, he also alleged that Ms. Michaels and the Judicial Justice of the Peace (or JJP for short) who had presided over his original trial, were also biased.

Mr. Sisett asserted that, during his trial in the Provincial Court, the JJP had admitted evidence that should have been inadmissible, had not allowed him to cross-examine witnesses or to produce evidence to rebut witness evidence.  He further argued that he had not been given enough time to prepare for his trial and, when he had requested an adjournment, the JJP had denied his request.

All these arguments as to the unfairness of the trial, or bias against Mr. Sisett, were rejected by Justice Weatherill when hearing the appeal.  However, that was not the end of the matter, for there were additional grounds for appeal put forward by Mr. Sisett.

Mr. Sisett suggested that the animal control bylaw was unfair in that it allowed for a dog to be deemed a dangerous dog for only one incident of aggressive behaviour; i.e. one bite.  He further argued that allowing an animal control officer to decide to declare a dog to be dangerous after only hearing from a couple of witnesses was authoritarian and over-reaching.  However, in response, Justice Weatherill dismissed these arguments, saying it was not up to the court to rewrite the bylaw to address these things that Mr. Sisett took issue with.

Justice Weatherill then went over the key rulings of the Judicial Justice of the Peace from the trial, to determine whether they stood up to scrutiny.

To begin with, Justice Weatherill looked at the decision which had been reached by the animal control officer, and then afterwards by the Provincial Court, that Charlie the Poodle was a dangerous dog.  He examined the definitions for the term “dangerous dog” found in the bylaw and in the provincial statute, known as the Community Charter.  He concluded that, based on these laws, it was proper for both the animal control officer and the JJP to have determined Charlie to be a dangerous dog.

Both the bylaw and the Community Charter have similar criteria for deciding whether a dog can be classified as dangerous, including whether it has caused serious injury to another animal.  In the case of Charlie, Justice Weatherill confirmed that he had done so. 

Charlie had picked up Spike in his jaws and shaken him violently, breaking Spike’s jaw and molar and leading to the need for two surgeries and veterinary treatment costing over $6000.  Even after the surgery and treatment, Spike had been left with a permanently twisted jaw, meaning he could now only eat soft food.

As the JJP presiding over the trial had concluded, Justice Weatherill was satisfied that Charlie was responsible for these injuries.  This was despite Mr. Sisett’s attempts at trial to argue that something or someone else may have caused these injuries; for example, perhaps they had been caused by Ms. Michaels herself, since she had been kicking during the incident, in an attempt to fend off Charlie and get him to release her dog.

Having ruled that the finding of Charlie to be a dangerous dog was justified, Justice Weatherill then went on to look over whether the JJP at the trial had been right to find that Mr. Sisett had “caused or permitted” Charlie to become dangerous.  This was the foundation of the conviction, because the charge had been that Mr. Sisett had violated section 36 of the bylaw, which read: “No person shall cause or permit his or her dog to become a Dangerous Dog.”

Here, at trial, the JJP had ruled that Mr. Sisett had been responsible for Charlie becoming dangerous because he had failed to exercise due diligence to prevent this.  He had pointed out that, at the time of the incident, he had been letting Charlie run off leash, even though this had been prohibited by the animal control bylaw.  The JJP had expressed his belief that, if Charlie had been on leash as the law had required, this whole unfortunate affair would never have occurred.

Justice Weatherill opined that, although the JJP may be right that keeping Charlie on leash as he was supposed to would’ve avoided the injuries to Spike, this was not what Mr. Sisett had been charged with.  He had not been charged with allowing his dog off leash, but rather with causing or permitting the dog to become dangerous.

In order for someone to cause or permit their dog to do something, or become something, Justice Weatherill ruled that there needed to be evidence that the person either actively participated in causing the thing or, at the very least, had knowledge of the thing being possible and didn’t prevent it.  Since there was no evidence that Mr. Sisett had actively encouraged his dog to be aggressive, and no evidence he knew the dog had aggressive tendencies, there was no proof he had caused or permitted the dangerous behaviour.  Consequently, on May 19th, 2022, Justice Weatherill ruled that Mr. Sisett’s conviction must be overturned and his $1000 fine nullified.

And there ends Part 2 of this case, but its not quite the end of the story, because there would be another incident and another legal case involving Charlie and his family.  If you would like to hear this third and final tale, please check out Part 3 of the Case of the Problematic Poodle.

SOURCES:

Community Charter, SBC 2003, c 26. https://canlii.ca/t/5660d

Michaels, K. (2022, May 23). No evidence Kelowna man caused dog to become dangerous: B.C. Supreme Court. Global News. https://globalnews.ca/news/8863694/kelowna-dangerous-poodle/

Potenteau, D. (2020, February 8). Kelowna woman seeking video help after pet dog allegedly attacked by poodle. Global News. https://globalnews.ca/news/6526240/kelowna-pet-dog-attacked-poodle/

Regional District of Central Okanagan Responsible Dog Ownership Bylaw No. 1343, 2014 (Consolidated). https://www.rdco.com/en/your-government/resources/Bylaws/BL1343-Consolidated-Regulate-License-Control-Responsible-Dog-Ownership-2023.pdf

R. v Sisett (2021, July 12), Kelowna M-1 4908-1 (BCPC). https://govlaw.ca/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Regina-v-Sisett-Reasons-for-Judgment-Filed-July-12-2021.pdf

R. v Sisett, 2022 BCSC 841 (CanLII). https://canlii.ca/t/jpbfh

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